Winter Sports Notebook 2017-18: Edwardsville High School

The Edwardsville Tigers finished the 2016-17 season in fine, but heart-breaking fashion.

The Tigers dropped the Class 4A state championship game by one point, 41-40 to Geneva, and finished with an outstanding 32-1 record.

Now EHS enters head coach Lori Blade’s 16th season with high expectations once again. The Tigers will have to fill the shoes of graduates Makenzie Silvey, Criste’on Waters and Jasmine Bishop. All three moved on to the collegiate basketball ranks.

A talented group returns though, led by three returning starters in seniors Rachel Pranger, Kate Martin and Myriah Noodel-Haywood. Martin recently signed a letter of intent to continue her basketball career at the University of Iowa.

“Haywood had a great summer, a great June with us and then the opportunity to go to Italy to play for 10 days,” Blade said. “She just seems so much more comfortable in what we’re trying to do and the system. She’s a ton more aggressive and I look for her to make a big jump from last year to this year.”

Sophomore Quierra Love and junior Jaylen Townsend also contributed some solid minutes last season and will be counted on for more this year. Others Blade sees contributing are, seniors Lauren Taplin and Rachel Vinyard, juniors Morgan Hulme, Megan Silvey and Maddy Stephen and 6-foot-2 freshman Katelynne Roberts.

“We have some young inexperienced kids that don’t have a lot of varsity experience that are going to need to step in and step up for us to be successful for us this year,” Blade said.

Edwardsville opens the season at 11:30 a.m. Saturday vs. Chatham Glenwood at the O’Fallon Tournament. The tourney is new to the schedule for the Tigers this year. EHS will also head to the Visitation Christmas Tournament this year.

The home opener is 7:30 p.m. Dec. 5 against Belleville East.

WRESTLING

The Tigers are going to be pretty inexperienced on the mat this season overall.

Fortunately they have a couple of Class 3A state medal winners in Noah Surtin and Luke Odom returning to steer the program. Odom was third at 106 pounds last year as a freshman, while Surtin was fifth at 113 as a sophomore.

EHS head coach Jon Wagner admitted it’s a benefit having them both around the same size too, allowing them to spar and push each other.

“They’ve been banging,” Wagner said. “It’s a great opportunity for them to be close in weight classes. It was a real plus last year and it’s going to be a real plus this year. They’ve had a great summer, worked hard and my goal is to get that paid off for their hard work and dedication.”

Besides those two the experience is limited. Josh Anderson did enjoy a strong season in ‘16-17. He wrestled at 220.

Others Wagner will look to on the mat are Will Zapanzi, Sam Martin, Norman Harris, Jack Evans and senior Dylan Wright.

He hasn’t got many of his wrestlers in the room yet with football still competing into the 8A semifinals this weekend.

“We’re going to be extremely young this year,” Wagner said. “We’ve only got one senior returning letterman (Wright), but we think we’ve got some guys in the room. When they all get in there, some have been playing football, so it’s kind of a hodge podge right now. The people we have in the room are working hard.

“We’ve been missing some guys, but that’s high school and how it is. Some of our best teams have been coming off some good football teams. It just may take a little longer to get things balanced out is all.”

The schedule is always grueling for the Tigers. Lots of trips north get them battle tested for the postseason.

“It’s what our formula is and we feel it’s right for the kids, so we’re going to continue to do that,” Wagner said.

Edwardsville’s home opener is 7 p.m. Nov 28 vs. Collinsville at the Jon Davis Wrestling Center. Then the Tigers head to the Fox Tournament on Dec. 1. They’ve added CBC to the schedule this year and go to the Columbia Hickman Tournament rather than the St. Charles Invitational.

BOYS BASKETBALL

Edwardsville will have quite a different look than it did a year ago when it went 30-2 and reached the super-sectionals.

Gone are three starters in A.J. Epenesa, Oliver Stephen and ‘16-17 Illinois Mr. Basketball Mark Smith. Only seniors Jack Marinko and Caleb Strohmeier return as starters with quality minutes on the floor from last year.

Marinko averaged 9.0 points per game, while Strohmeier scored at 7.7 points per clip. The remainder of the roster will feature a lot of inexperience and much of it is still being figured out with the EHS football team alive in the 8A state semifinals.

Other seniors on the roster will be Cole Scarbrough, R.J. Wilson, Craig Roberts and Tyler Halling.

The Tigers open the season at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 21 at DeSmet. The home opener is 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 28 vs. Soldan.

ICE HOCKEY

EHS will feature both a Mid-States League team and a varsity MVCHA squad for the second straight season.

The Mid-States Tigers enter their second season in the league after finishing 15-5-1 and advancing to the semifinals of the Mid-States tournament in the postseason.

Stanley Lucas, Trevor Dailey, Mitchell Oberlag and Matt Griffin return with major experience for the Tigers. Griffin had a .931 save percentage and a 17-6-1 record which included 3 shutouts in goal along with 578 saves.

Entering this week Edwardsville is 1-2 in the Mid-States League.

As for the MVCHA Tigers, they advanced to the 2A semifinals in the playoffs last season and finished with a 16-6-2 mark.

Edwardsville opened the season on Monday at the East Alton Ice Arena against Granite City.

The Tigers will have a pretty new look in ‘17-18. John Paul Twombley, Micah Bell, Logan Corzine, Nathaniel Frey, Josh Lavick and Chase Lawrence return from last season.

Jason Walker remains head coach of both squads.

BOYS AND GIRLS BOWLING

Kimber Wilderman returns for her second season as head coach of the EHS boys and girls bowling programs.

Last season neither team were able to advance out of regionals, but had individuals move to sectionals.

On the boys side, Hunter Noud and Eddie Sims both advanced out of the Salem Regional, but have now graduated from the program. As for the girls, Edwardsville had a couple of sophomores escape from the Triad Regional — Sydney Sahuri and Rachel McTague. Both will return this year. Sahuri was the Edwardsville AdVantage News Girls Bowler of the Year for the ‘16-17 season.

The Tiger boys opened the season on Nov. 11 at the Zachary Lecuyer Memorial Invitational, while the girls begin their campaign on Saturday at the Triad Invitational at Camelot Bowl.